To Save Him
by Usiel21
Summary: A Deal From El's Perspective. Mike sacrificed his soul for Eleven, but now she risks unleashing the first beasts onto Earth in order to save him from the tortures of hell, she alone knew the risks and without a second thought she would step into both Hell and Purgatory. Two-Shot, 3rd chapter up soon!
1. Aftermarth

Once More Into Hell

Eleven Hopper was knelt on the floor, her boyfriends chest ripped to pieces by an invisible force. Her scream tore through Hawkins, her despair so great that in a five mile radius glass shattered into a million fragments, several bushes instantly were set aflame, the once clear night was now full of thunderous lightning, the manifestation of anger and grief.

Eleven could still sense the invisible presence of the Hell-hound in the room, without a second thought she raised her hand and she heard a pitiful yelp as her powers tore the Mutt's head off, both body and head fell with a wet thud.

Her tear stricken face slowly revolved to look at Mike, she felt the resolve to continue every second quickly escape her being, Mike was her world and here he lay, dead at her feet. Flashing Blue and Red lights began to illuminate the room, the sound of an engine more prominent through the broken window.

Hopper burst into the room, revolver drawn, it swayed this way and that as Hopper scanned the room before settling on the two in the middle of the room, one alive, one dead. Hopper quickly holstered his weapon and hastened to the girls side, she wept into his shoulder as Hopper took in the damage.

Mike's eyes remained open, lifeless, staring up at the ceiling, Hopper knew something had happened the moment his car windows along with every window in the street suddenly shattered into pieces, only El had the raw power to do it.

Hoppers eyes closed in silent sorrow, as he realised he would have to tell Karen that her boy had been ripped to shreds, Mike had been one of the pillars in El's life and now that he was gone, he feared for her state of mind. Feared for what would happen now.

El tearfully, through heart-wrenching sobs explained what had happened, the window, the wounds suddenly ripping themselves into Mike's chest and everything else that happened after including ripping an invisible forces head off. Hopper leaned forward to where El had pointed and felt the mass that was invisible, it would need to be burned if possible.

A MONTH LATER…

Everyone had been devastated, no more than Eleven, she retreated into her previously mute state, she would not talk only gesture with nods or shakes of her head. She didn't cry after that night, her eyes held a haunted and anguished look to them, her soul was being eaten away by grief. Her powers were all over the place and they would spike at times causing different things to happen, once she was walking down the road when suddenly lights burst, the ground beneath her would crack, the weather would rapidly change and glass would yet again shatter.

The funeral was beautiful, they buried him with his supercomm and his D&D campaign book, Eleven's brown eyes never left his coffin during the entire service, practically everyone in the small town turned out for it, Mike was known to everyone, Mike was liked by everyone and Mike was loved by everyone.

The boys stood with El the entire time, for that she was grateful but she couldn't speak, because if she did she would spill her tears and she would never stop, her grief would end up destroying all of Hawkins.

The coffin was lowered, flowers were thrown atop and finally the dirt was placed upon it. The Gravestone read

Michael James Wheeler

Born August 15th 1971

Died July 8th 1994

A Beloved Son, Friend and Dungeon Master

And cherished Boyfriend

Eleven's gaze broke from the headstone and she could sense something not entirely human, her head rose to see a man from across the way to see a tall man, in his thirties, dressed in a suit, the tie, however was loose and inside out, a tan trench coat was drawn around him.

Eleven could sense something odd as he stared back her unblinking before he slowly turned and walked away from her, she could sense he was mostly human but there was a great power within him, barely contained inside the human, the others shouted after her as she broke into a run, chasing the man down, she was mere metres from him when he turned out of the cemetery and out of sight, there was a small flutter of wings as she rounded the corner to find the man was no where to be seen, her brow frowned in confusion as her head turned this way and that searching for him but he was long gone.

She wandered back to the grave and she sat down with her legs crossed, the sun set and night befell Hawkins and Eleven kept her silent vigil over his grave, she suddenly stood up and turned away and marched off home, a new emotion had taken over. Determination.

Eleven then spent the next several months in Hawkins Library looking up creatures that could be invisible which is pretty much all she had to go on, hours upon hours of fruitless searching but everyday from dawn till dusk she would come and read every book that could have the information that she was looking for.

Two weeks later she was browsing the stacks when from behind her a book began to move of its own accord from behind her, it inched its way off the shelf and it fell to the floor with a heavy thud, Eleven jumped and turned to look at the book titled " _Lore of Perdition"_

Unseen to her a man in a tan trench coat vanished in a flutter of wings.

Eleven sat down with the very heavy book and began to read and what she read began to fill her with many emotions, one of which was stomach-wrenching hole in the pit of her stomach, particularly the bit she read.

" _and upon making a deal with a demon that person has ten years before the hellhounds come to collect, a hellhound is a demonic dog, trained by their demonic handlers to fetch the souls of the damned when their time is up, upon retrieval their contract is fulfilled and the soul is dragged to hell to be turned into a demon themselves through torture and the fires which strip their soul of light until it becomes a blackened, Sulfur covered husk, no longer human and stripped of everything, Demons are ruthless and take joy in the torture and murder of others._

 _Hellhounds themselves are invisible to everyone apart from other supernatural entities and the people that they have been sent to collect…"_

Eleven slammed the book shut as she fought to stop the bile from rising in her throat, so was that what Mike had done? Made a deal to save her, it was highly suspicious as to how she ended up in his basement that night that she had returned, Mike's explanation seemed convincing enough but now the pieces were starting to make sense, it was ten years since she got back, even the date was the same, she took a deep breath and reopened the book.

" _One month on Earth is ten years in Hell, time passes differently…"_

Had Mike really been in Hell for sixty years? As it was now January, her eyes welled up, after everything she had read he could be a demon by now, stripped of his humanity and now nothing but black smoke. She refused to believe that Mike was a demon, she flat out refused in her mind and so she kept reading and the book began to talk about another dimension, Purgatory.

" _Purgatory, like Earth has different biomes and weather systems, even though monsters there prey upon each other there are certain areas in which even Leviathan stay clear from, the dark zone"_

A chill found itself making its way up Elevens spine as she continued to read about the Dark Zone

" _A place of Eternal Night, compared to the rest of purgatory, the dark zone is where the nastiest of creatures reside, not much is known expect for the fact only the stronger Leviathan choose to hunt there and that demons fear the place as well, its creatures easily able to kill demons"_

Eleven slammed the book shut for one final time, she carefully looked around before placing the book in her backpack and leaving.

Later that night she stood in the backyard of her home, it now seemed lifeless and soulless without Mike there. Eleven stared at the shed, ready to do what needed to be done, her hand stretched forth, the ground began to rumble in protest as her power began to rip through the fabric of reality, Lightning started to flash against the sky, illuminating the tear that she was now making, a voice from behind ripped out of her concentration.

"I really wouldn't do that if I were you"

Eleven spun round and out of instinct she threw a wave of power at the figure now in front of her, he stood completely untouched as her power washed through him the only indicator was his clothes reacting to the rush of energy.

There stood a man with a gaunt face, dressed like a funeral director with a long black cane, his hair black, she could sense the sheer power radiating off the man like a waterfall and it was drowning her senses

"Why not?" she asked, it was one of the first times she spoke in months and it showed, her voice was almost hoarse from non use.

The man smiled "your tearing a hole in the fabric of reality, there are not many that can do such a thing and do it safely" he said "well I can" he added amusement in his tone.

"I could sense the echo of your power from the future and since I was locked away under the Earth I could not do anything, however, I am here now, you must not open the door"

"and why not" she growled, she was losing her patience, every second she spent here was a second wasted

"I take it you read that book, that blasted book, if you open that door you risk this world falling prey to the Leviathan, I personally found them fun to watch but they were locked away to keep them from eating everything in sight and now you risk that again by opening the door"

She turned away to face the shed where she was determined to open the gate.

"I need to do this, I need to save Mike"

The man in black huffed in annoyance "Humans and your bravado, you are just as bad as Dean, always trying to save others at the expense of the natural order, very well don't say I didn't warn you" and like that he was gone

Eleven stretched out her hand and the portal began to open, with a final grunt of effort the gate had been made, however, it was not like the gate at the lab, it was a great black gaping hole, it was sucking the air into it, the noise was like that of a waterfall, with a deep breath she stepped through and into the world on the other side.

Eleven stepped into Purgatory, the gate immediately closed behind her, trapping her, but what surprised her the most was that purgatory was similar to earth, there were trees and hell it was even a sunny day, she needed to find the dark zone however. She stretched out her senses to locate the dark zone. Even in a land of abominations there were places even they feared to tread.

But her eyes shot open as she felt something rapidly closing in on her position, her eyes darted everywhere but she could not see anything, that was until two black shapes impacted the ground metres from where she stood, the black goo within shifted until it became two human males, also dressed in plain black clothing

"Human!" one of them hissed at Eleven

El took a cautious step back, not knowing what these things were, one of them ran forward tackling her to ground with surprising speed, it raised its head, but its jaw opened up impossibly wide as a set of razor sharp teeth and two reptile like tongues revealed themselves. Before it could take a bite however El summoned her powers and threw the creature as far back as she could, the creature found itself impaled on a tree branch, black goo oozed from the wound.

To her surprise the creature began laughing. She sprang back to her feet as blood began to slowly drip from her nose

"Takes more than that to kill Leviathan sweetheart" it sneered at her

El watched in horror as the Leviathan slid off the tree branch and landed back on the ground, it didn't seem at all perturbed at the hole in its chest. He grinned maliciously.

"its been so long since we tasted human flesh, the other things here make me want to heave, I can smell her flesh from here, so succulent" the other Leviathan said

Then they both charged the stunned El, instinctively her arms shot up to defend herself, but she powers strained to push the two Leviathan back, but they stumbled forward step by step like they were tracking through sludge.

"Now, now we don't want to make a mess now do we in front of this fine lady?"

A beefy middle-aged man stepped into the clearing, in each hand was a makeshift blade made of bone and his face was unshaven and he held a smile as he stood beside El. He nodded at her and held out one of the blades to her.

"chop the head off darling" he said turning his attention back to the Leviathan

"Vampire!" the impaled vampire spat

The Leviathan sprinted to the both of them, the vamp managed to grapple his one and throw him to the floor. El panicked and fell over as she stumbled backwards, the blade fell several feet away from her, the Leviathan was on top of her in an instant, its jaw line expanded, about to devour her.

But it couldn't. it let out a frustrated growl as it found its head held in place by an invisible force, El's face was contorted in pain as blood began to pour from her nose and ears, she began to scream as the Leviathans head slowly began to separated from it's body, black ooze was going everywhere.

Finally the head rolled off to the side and the body collapsed on top of her, she pushed it off in disgust, she looked over to see the Vampire had taken care of his Leviathan and now was stood above her, hand held out.

She slowly and cautiously took it as he easily hauled her small frame to her feet.

"Who are you?" she asked

"Names Benny and you?"

"El" she said simply

Benny nodded thoughtfully

"and what's a human like you doing in a place like this?

"I'm looking for the Darkzone"

Benny's face instantly darkened "you don't want to go to that place, that's suicide, even those Leviathan go nowhere near it" he paused for a moment "why do u even want to go there?" he asked

"I have unfinished business with the monsters there" she glanced over her shoulder before looking back "and I'm trying to save someone"

Benny nodded in understanding "this someone must be important to you to risk death there"

"Life without him is meaningless, he was everything to me and now he's gone and I can think of nothing else but getting him back"

Benny again nodded in understanding "I too loved someone long ago, one of the reasons I died was because of the love I had for her" Benny said with regret evident in his voice.

"Will you help me?" she asked

"Yes I can, but I can only show you where, I cannot enter that place myself however"

"Is there anything you can tell me about the darkzone?" she asked as they began walking alongside a river.

Benny was silent for a moment, gathering his thoughts before speaking "there is more than one darkzone, Purgatory is like Earth, the whole place is identical, its also identical in the fact that exact replicas of cities and towns from earth reside in the dark zone's"

El nodded in understanding

"as far as I know the monsters that reside there feast upon humans who slip through the barriers that separate Earth and Purgatory, those specific monsters never leave the Darkzone and us regular monsters don't go near it either and like I said before the Leviathan even fear that place, only the strongest of their kind go there to hunt humans"

"where is the nearest darkzone?" she asked

"About an hours walk that way" Benny said raising his arm in the direction that they were travelling. For most of that hour they stayed silent, twice they came across a small group of Vampires that were easily dispatched by the duo, El noted that Benny liked to whistle as he fought. El used her power to make their presence invisible to all but the Leviathan who were immune to that particular magic.

Soon the sky began to grow dark, but not because the sun was setting. The small white flakes that fell from the sky began to increase in number as approached the Darkzone.

Benny came to a halt.

"this is as far as I can go, this environment is poisonous to my kind"

El turned around with a smile

"thank you Benny" she said

"don't thank me, I'm sending you to die showing you where one of these places are"

"I can handle them" she said determinedly "I was trapped here for ten months ten years ago, it didn't destroy then and it wont destroy me now"

Benny approached and kissed her hand politely, before turning around and walking away, El watched him leave, before he turned back on his heel"

"I hope you find that boy you were talking about, I really do"

She gave a small smile in response, he tipped his cap to her before walking off and out of sight.

El turned her attention back to the darkzone, or as she knew it, the upside down.

She stepped into the toxic mist knowing what must be done, but whether it could be done was a different matter entirely, but if she failed Mike would be lost to her forever.


	2. A Darker World

The world around her became darker as she strode through the darkzone, or as she known it as; The Upside Down. The air grew stale as the radioactive flakes grew in number and size. She was now in the darkest depths of Purgatory.

Her thoughts wandered now that she was alone, drifting back to Mike as per usual. What if this plan failed? What if she managed to find him but he was already a demon, would he recognize her, would he try and kill her? And would she be able to accept that reality? She already lost him once and here was a lifeline to bring him back but if he was already lost to her and there was nothing but hatred and evil, she would lose the will to continue.

And every minute was most likely a week or two in Hell, how time was compressed in such a manner was beyond that of El's understanding, at least the timeframes of Purgatory and Earth were the same, especially seeing how Purgatory was not that dissimilar from Earth.

Her mission here was clear, she could not take on Hell on her own, so she would need the help of a sworn Enemy, if it could be done was unknown to her as she never got this far beforehand plus the plan was not of her own mind, it was that of Brenner's.

Brenner's original plan was to make contact with the demogorgan, using El to study its being, report her findings back to him and determine whether or not they could be used for their experiments. Perhaps even trained or domesticated. The insane plan of an even insaner madman. And here she was acting out that very plan.

She never thought she would be here seeking out the demogorgan under her own violation. The gate she had opened by accident back in 83 had been shut for years, it closed when she killed the demogorgan back in the classroom and she herself transported to Purgatory as she didn't have full control of her abilities.

Unbeknownst to everyone even Mike, When El was in the Upside-down for those long months, she befriended a small hedgehog like animal, that would burrow through the ground, along with the box she found food in every now and again, the creature would bring back berries for her to eat, it was enough to sustain her between the food drops in the box. Also in that time her powers and the things she could do had grown exceptionally, she no longer needed the bath to astral project herself between dimensions, she sometimes used that ability when things were quiet to watch Mike, wishing she could be there with him, she could see the despair in his eyes, the way his smile never reached his eyes and when things were quiet and he was alone, she could see the toll that it was taking on him.

El had been walking through the Upside-down for half an hour and yet there was no sign of the demogorgan, Leviathan or any other Purgatory or Darkzone native, just the ever falling flakes of ash and toxicity.

El carefully sat with her back against a tree, she needed a rest, using her powers to open the gate, fighting the Leviathan and the walking had taken it out of her, she was drained physically and mentally. She closed her eyes and focused, drawing strength from the world around her, its energy reinvigorating her. She stayed there for a long time, letting the energy flow through her, she smiled slightly, knowing that Mike would make a Star Wars reference about the force flowing through her.

She was snapped out of her trance like state as she heard the unmistakeable growl and strange echo like rumbles of the demogorgan, her eyes snapped open to see the Demogorgan around twenty-five yards opposite her, but what made her frown was that it was not facing her, in fact it was facing something else entirely

She watched as the Demogorgan was tackled to the ground by what was evidently a Leviathan, probably one of the strongest of their kind as Benny had said, the demogorgan's face opened like the petals of a flower as it gripped the Leviathan and flung it mightily into a tree, ripping the tree from its and toppling with a loud bang.

The demogorgan however did not pursue, instead it leant forward onto its forearms, almost in a protective stance in front of a mound of earth near a dead and fairly large oak tree.

El watched this from her spot, thankful she herself had not been discovered, it was starting to dawn on her why the demogorgans behaviour was different and not as aggressive as it normally would be.

The Leviathan stood up from it landed, a maniacal smile he bore suddenly became that expanded jaw of two tongues and teeth as it swiftly closed the distance between itself and the demogorgan before managing to clamp down on the demogorgans shoulder.

The demogorgan let out an intense painful shriek as it toppled over, consumed by pain as the Leviathan began to rip its flesh off. El watched almost horrified at this, whilst she hated the demogorgan species, naturally because of what happened, she could bare to see it in obvious pain, instead she felt anger towards the Leviathan, whilst the demogorgan was little more than an animal albeit a twisted one, the Leviathan on the other hand seemed malicious and sadistic in nature.

El's hand extended towards the Leviathan, where she suddenly flung her closed fist to the left and the Leviathan was torn away from the demogorgan, The Leviathan angrily turned to face El, its teeth deep red with blood. The demogorgan half limped, half crawled into the mound of Earth and out of sight.

El's anger intensified as one hand held the Leviathan helplessly in place and with the other hand she began to pull one by one the arms and legs off the leviathan, copious amounts of black blood began to splatter the ground as El used this method to rip apart the Leviathan, finally with twist of her head the Leviathans own head found itself rolling until it settled near her feet, its expanded jaw frozen.

El's breathing began to slow back to normal levels, for an unknown reason she saw red, she had never killed anything like that before, not in that manner, when she killed the demogorgan back in 83 she had done it as quickly as possible. Her head was drenched in sweat, her hair thankfully wasn't, she kept it short though, just past her ears, since short hair was all she had known she found long hair quite irritating so she kept it short.

Now that she had calmed down she cautiously approached the mound of earth in which the injured Demogorgan had crawled into away from the fight, she could hear the laboured breathing from the creature within.

As she peered within the mound of earth what she saw both shocked her and fascinated her, behind the injured demogorgan were nine small curled grey balls. She realized they were infant Demogorgans, that's why the demogorgan hadn't been as aggressive to the Leviathan, it was being careful as it was trying to protect it's young.

The demogorgan weakly raised itself back onto all fours, it weakly roared at El before collapsing once again into the dirt, unable to stand due to its fight with the Leviathan. Just like when she accidentally opened the gate, she slowly move forward, hand extended, it was mere inches away from the creatures grey hide.

Slowly and carefully she placed her small hand upon it's body.


	3. Obedience

El sent waves of calm through her hand and into the Demogorgan, never had she tried to do this to such an extreme degree much less on a creature that could rip a mere human apart in seconds and go toe to toe with Leviathan. She had used that power to help calm people down when they nervous, like Dustin for example when he went on one of his "oh my god" rants.

The creature itself immediately tensed up, El started to regret placing her hand on its leather like hide, would it attack her? Her other hand twitched in reflex to the thought.

Slowly the demogorgan turned its head to regard her, the thing had no eyes but El could tell it was looking at her, it was discomforting to say the least but she maintained eye contact with it, sending her intensions through more waves of energy.

Tentatively, she removed her hand, still not knowing whether or not the creature before her was going to attack her, if it did, it most likely would kill her, powers or not she was too close to it. The demogorgan gave a whimper as it lay down next to its young. One of them had uncurled from its ball and looked at her letting out a small resonating hum before returning to its ball. Unconcerned with her presence.

El carefully climbed back out of the whole and to her horror the Leviathan's limbs had started to reattach themselves, in a blind panic she ran over to the body and grabbing its leg she began to drag it towards the mound, only its head remained separate. Black blood trailed along the ground from where the neck was separated from the head.

She heaved it into the cave like dwelling of the creatures and left it by the demogorgans feet, the nine young demogorgans were now alert and moved in to devour the corpse, El turned and sat at the entrance to the mound with her back to the entrance, the sound of flesh being ripped from bone was clear as day as the young feasted.

The mature and much larger Demogorgan, slowly walked up behind her, its shadow was cast over her body and El slowly turned to face it, it let out its own resonating hum as it came to a stop to regard her. Its head lowered to look at her.

Human and Monster.

Enemy and Ally.

El and The Demogorgan.

From that moment something dynamic had changed, once both would have been trying to kill each other and now here she sat, the monster behind her and yet she did not fear for her safety, no, she felt a calmness in the air, even if it was the air of the Upside down.

The Darkzone, Purgatory.

She sat there for some time, watching the offspring of the demogorgan, once in awhile they would shift position without uncurling from their ball. The adult demogorgan wandered in the vicinity close to the mound of earth. Prowling.

But it was time for her to leave the toxic environment, her energies had been replenished and she stood near a large tree fairly close to the mound of earth. Her hand was stretched forth as the ground began to shake with deep rumbles of thunder as she forced the portal back to the normal world open, her brows furrowed deep in concentration and with a final push of psychokinetic energy the gate opened, disgusting and slimy. Blood gushed from her nose due to the effort.

Nearby the demogorgan growled lightly upon sensing the blood in its midst, El turned her head to look at the demogorgan as it wandered up to her. She wondered if it could understand her?

"I'll be back" She said simply.

The demogorgan cocked its head and to her immense surprise it nodded slightly, did it really just do that? Could it really comprehend the meaning behind her words?

She smiled at the monster in front of her, her plan was coming to fruition. She turned back to the gate and crawled through it and before she knew it she was back in the real world. The gate slowly closed behind her.

She found herself several miles away from Hawkins. Not far off considering, hopefully she would be able to open the gates she needed closer to Hawkins and to that location in the upside-down.

She shivered as she walked back, the air was particularly bitter that time of year, she was confident in her plan, now that stage one was now complete, although originally she was going to dominate its mind with her powers, force it to her will but it turned out that was no longer needed.

She entered her quiet house, evermore so due to the missing presence of Mike, at one point things had been going so well for them, they lived together, they both had a job. Mike ironically had been working at the Hawkins National Lab, the department of energy had long since abandoned the place and now was run by the department of genetics and biology. Most of the work being undertaken was to do with gene manipulation of crops. According to Mike they were close to a breakthrough, El worked as a teaching assistant at Hawkins Middle School, her life experience helping greatly in such a role, helping several children with mental hindrances and barriers. It was a good life until now

She sat with the tome that she stole from the Library, leather bound and she could sense it was a very old book, older than America itself. The withered man in black called it a blasted Book and she could see why as she skimmed the pages, apart from the information on Hell and its even more limited information of Purgatory there were spells, rituals and more information on stealing souls, using them to enhance one's self.

At the end of the book, there was a hastily scrawled bit of writing that made no sense to her even though it was written in English, regardless of the fact she couldn't understand it, it still sent a a chill down her spine.

"God help us if the 66 seals are broken, lest the serpent be released from the cage"

She closed the book gently, she headed to bed, completely wiped out from the last couple of weeks. She was going to save Mike and now she nearly had half the means to do so.

HELL

Alastair stood outside a pair of double doors, he gulped slightly as he looked at the being in front of him.

"Alastair, please tell me you have good news for me, you are afterall Hell's best torturer"

Alastair smiled slightly at his own self-proclaimed title.

"Mr Wheeler is proving very resilient, I have had to come up with brand new methods of torture both physical and psychological, for the last ten years I have been trying to make him believe he was being tortured by his whore"

The being turned round to look at Alastair, his yellow eyes stood out brightly in the dim corridor of Hell.

"Then it will be all the more sweeter when he finally succumbs to your methods, I'm still looking for Lilith, unfortunately she is in the deepest pits of Hell, even I am having trouble reaching her"

Alastair fingered his razor, it was still covered in Mikes blood.

"and the cage?"

"Still inaccessible" Yellows eyes said.

"I never knew it would be so hard to break a righteous man" Alastair said as he peered through the small windows on the double doors to the current occupant on the rack.

"Break him now, before those pigeons decide to put a stop to this"

Alastair nodded and strode through the double doors, yellow-eyes stood as the screaming started once again, he walked off whistling a tune. The most anyone had lasted before giving in to the torture was thirteen years in Hell, this boy had lasted for sixty years so far.


End file.
